More power, less sound?!

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

Hi guys. I have a Kenwood 8102D amp, which says it's either 300W or 550W, with 1100W max. As a side question, how do I know if it's running at 300 or 550 watts?

Anyways, I had it hooked up to a Rockford Fosgate Punch 2 12" sub, which was only rated at 200 watts RMS. This sub was very loud actually, but I blew it after about 6 months.

Now I go to an audio place and the guy talks me into buying a Kaption 12" subwoofer for more than I paid for the RF. But it's ok because the Kaption is 600W RMS, which matches up a lot better with my amp than the RF 200W sub.

Low and behold, I get in the car after the guy installs it, and this sub is actually quieter than the last sub. How can that be considering the new one is almost 3X the power handling. My amp should be able to drive it even louder than the old sub, right?

I opened up the amp to see if the guy had fiddled with the settings, but I don't think he did. This sub is just LESS loud than the 200W RF sub. What is going on?

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[GemaRastem 10+ year member]

you are giving the same amount of wattage no matter which sub you use as long as your are running it at the same load. That sub must be less efficient than the RF sub. Pretty much meaning that it gets less loud on the same amount of power.

 

[khail19 10+ year member]

What voice coil configurations are the 2 subs?

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

you are giving the same amount of wattage no matter which sub you use as long as your are running it at the same load. That sub must be less efficient than the RF sub. Pretty much meaning that it gets less loud on the same amount of power.

****. What a friggin' waste of money.

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

What voice coil configurations are the 2 subs?

The new kaption just says "2.5 inch voice coil on aluminum former", this sub is dual voice coil

My old RF sub says "2 inch aluminum voice coil former", this sub was single voice coil

 

[jujumantb 10+ year member]

The new kaption just says "2.5 inch voice coil on aluminum former"
My old RF sub says "2 inch aluminum voice coil former"

no, impedance wise. aka ohm load. Could be 4 ohm, dual 4 ohm, dual 2 ohm... etc This is VERY important for how much power your amp will put out. The lower the impedance, the more power the amp can produce. You know how much power you amp is able to put out by this number, amps are rated for a ceratin wattage at a particular impedance, ie. "500watts @ 4 ohm, 1000watts @ 1ohm"... etc..

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

no, impedance wise. aka ohm load. Could be 4 ohm, dual 4 ohm, dual 2 ohm... etc This is VERY important for how much power your amp will put out. The lower the impedance, the more power the amp can produce. You know how much power you amp is able to put out by this number, amps are rated for a ceratin wattage at a particular impedance, ie. "500watts @ 4 ohm, 1000watts @ 1ohm"... etc..

Old RF: Single voice coil 4/8 ohm

New Kaption: Dual voice coil 2/4 ohm

How do I know which way that they're wired up?

I can tell you that the amp has 2 pos and 2 neg inputs. The sub has 1 wire going into the 1st pos and a second wire going into the 1st neg terminals.

 

[khail19 10+ year member]

Old RF: Single voice coil 4/8 ohm
New Kaption: Dual voice coil 2/4 ohm

This still isn't helping. The RF is either SVC 4 ohm OR SVC 8 ohm. The Kaption should be either DVC 2 ohm OR DVC 4 ohm. They can't be both. It should say on the back of the sub what they are.

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

This still isn't helping. The RF is either SVC 4 ohm OR SVC 8 ohm. The Kaption should be either DVC 2 ohm OR DVC 4 ohm. They can't be both. It should say on the back of the sub what they are.

Ok, sorry guys I'm learning as I go here. Ok, I looked at the old RF and it's SVC 4ohm, the new Kaption is a SPL1200D4, and I'm guessing that means DVC 4ohm.

So they're the same ohm. I guess that means nothing changed really right? Which means that this new sub, while able to handle 3 times the RMS as the old RF, is quieter? Man what a rip. I paid $300 for this new sub. I could have bought another RF for like $200.

If I'm missing anything here let me know. Is it possible to wire the Kaption to 2ohm? Which I assume would make it louder right?

 

[wilzyx 5,000+ posts]

that amp isnt very good for powering 1 sub because isnt it a 2 channel? i guess you could try wiring each voice coil into each channel on the amp.

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

that amp isnt very good for powering 1 sub because isnt it a 2 channel? i guess you could try wiring each voice coil into each channel on the amp.

Ok I'm going to sound retarded because I'm not sure if it's a 2 channel amp or 1.

it has 2 pairs of pos/neg terminals to hook speakers up to. I'm guessing that makes it a 2 channel right?

The way it is hooked up is one wire into the pos in the first pair and one wire into the neg in the second pair.

 

[wilzyx 5,000+ posts]

ya that is a 2 channel and just hook up each + and - to from each voice coil to the amp

 

[ripxtide 10+ year member]

ya that is a 2 channel and just hook up each + and - to from each voice coil to the amp

Cool I didn't know I could do that. What is that process called? Bridging the sub?

 

[alphakenny1 10+ year member]

^ doesn't necessarily mean its a two channel. a lot of mono amps have two sets of positive and negative terminals.

second you need to give the specs of your amp. like copy and paste from somewhere. also just because it has more power handling doens't mean it'll get louder. i mean there are so if and buts in your problem that we can't exactly say why the sub isn't louder. we need more info. what is the sub hooked up to? 2 ohm or 8 ohm? but just reading from your posts, you probably don't know. find out!

 

[alphakenny1 10+ year member]

also looking at your amp, it has D on the end, usually that means your amp is a class D amp and most of the time those are mono amps so you have a mono amp.

specs of the amp:

300w x 1 @ 4-ohms

550w x 1 @ 2-ohms